I am fascinated by song stories...the glimpses of composers' lives that their creations permit us to see, although oftentimes not so readily. Here are my my "scoops", posted here for your enjoyment, and for what I hope will feed our mutual curiosity about His musical purposes for us. Join me in this history adventure, as we find what circumstances coalesced to create the songs we all love! Play detective with me, and tell me what song "scoops" you may know that I don't...yet.

About Me

Saturday, November 28, 2015

She was nearly anonymous, and maybe a little clairvoyant? Could
that be the two characteristics most often associated with the all-too brief career
of songwriter Elizabeth King Mills? She had a notable spouse, and she also died
as a young woman, but if the words of her hymn “We’ll Work Till Jesus Comes”
tell us more, then we could also say she certainly put her hope and trust in
Christ, and speculate that she in fact longed for the next life. Was she unhappy with her mortal existence, as
one might surmise from her poem? What led to her early departure from the
Earth? What does the work-energy model of you and me look like – a scientific
equation (like one shown here), or some other model?

Elizabeth Mills lived only into her mid-20s in the early
portion of the 19th Century, so perhaps much of her potential went
unrealized. One might think that the spouse of a member of England’s Parliament
would have had more recorded biographic information, yet relatively few details
of Mills’ life are apparently known. She began life in 1805 in London as the
daughter of Philip King, and later was the wife of Thomas Mills, a member of
England’s legislative body. In April 1829 she died, but of what cause is
unknown, though we can imagine it might have been considered tragic because of
her young age – just 24 or 25. Was she aware of a health issue that could
shorten her life? It’s another question without an answer, yet one might think
she had some clue that earthly life held no guarantees. One of her handful of
hymns, “We Speak of the Realms of the Blest”, was written just a few weeks
before her death, and thematically hints of someone looking beyond this life. In
fact, some of Mills’ other song poems have the same trait, not too surprising for
a believer, but nevertheless perhaps revealing of her emotional state. “We’ll
Work…” shows Elizabeth imagined a peaceful, restful home, a place where she
could put aside earthly concerns. Was her life unhappy, maybe because of health
or another kind of challenge? For her,
songwriting may have been therapeutic, if this were true. Perhaps her
circumstances also allowed her to grasp an elemental truth – mortality.

Elizabeth apparently accepted one fact, which led to her
recognition of another. Not a lot of philosophical hairsplitting needs to
happen to know the following: death is real, and I need an escape hatch. Do you
suppose Elizabeth’s poetry evolved because her demise was imminent, cruelly
thrust upon her? If so, she could have been bitter. Yet, she must have instead sensed
that the other end of the life equation was not in doubt, courtesy of our
Creator. I didn’t like math in school, but I think the math solution Elizabeth
found is the one I need too. What about you? If He could construct me to work
like this diagram above, do you think He’s got the other stuff in hand too?

Saturday, November 21, 2015

His
words published by 1890 and put to music probably were the subject of more than
one sermon he delivered. Frank Bottome’s “The Comforter Has Come” (may also be known
by its first line ‘O Spread the Tidings ‘Round’) was a declaration of some
exciting news he wanted to share with hearers, probably as he considered the
difficulties some of them could not escape. Certainly, some of them – in fact,
all of us – need Him to come and be like the dove that alit on Jesus (shown
here in the Portuguese painter Almeida Junior’s 1895 artwork). What else might
have motivated this 67-year old minister to remind believers that God is still
present, that His Spirit should not be forgotten?

Frank
Bottome began and finished his life as an Englishman, and in between those two
points began his life’s ministry and built his poetic resume that expressed his
faith through music in America. Though born in north-central England in 1823,
Bottome immigrated to the New World when he was 27 and began his work in the
Methodist Episcopalian Church. As he turned 40, he’d received an honorary
doctorate in theology, while also being active in music and ministry
concurrently. He wrote a few dozen hymn texts, and also compiled several
hymnals, including the 1890 compilation (Precious
Times of Refreshing and Revival) in which his thoughts and zeal about the “The
Comforter..” first appeared. Perhaps his words in the verses tell us all we
need to know about the circumstances of its development. Verses one through
three hint that human struggle was on Bottome’s mind, as the ‘woes’ (v.1), ‘wail’
(v.2), and ‘captive’ (v.3) nature of our earthbound days spoke to him. It’s
likely that Bottome was engaged in reading about the Comforter described in
John’s gospel (chapters 14-16) in the King James version, the bible translation
most common for his time. Was it an aggrieved church member, even himself, or
perhaps an unbeliever that he was seeking to encourage as he read from John and
composed his poem? His role as a minister must have brought him into contact
with many whose daily woes and captivity troubled his spirit. How does the
average soul confront the ‘dreadful wail’ and ‘fury of the blast’, an
unavoidable hurricane-like storm? As he approached his life’s conclusion in his
late ‘60s, perhaps Bottome -- who lived just a few additional years, until he
died in 1894 – wanted some reassurance himself. He apparently returned to
England as he approached Eternity, and went on to the next life while in a
small village in the southwest portion of that island nation.

Somewhere
along the way, after Bottome’s original words expressed his thoughts, alternate
language has been employed in the song’s verses and refrain, thus shining the
light on another member of the Trinity. So, in some versions of the song, the “Comforter”
does not make His appearance, while ‘the Lord of lords’ and ‘King of kings’ is
lauded -- also very appropriate, but notably different than what Frank Bottome
wanted to convey. It raises the issue of which members of the Godhead we should
honor, or at least the modifiers of Bottome’s poem must have thought so. Why
did Jesus send the Comforter? He wouldn’t have come, except that Jesus
completed His mission first, and then called for the Spirit to accompany us in this
next era. Our earthly days and our future days are both important to God,
undeniably. We’ll see God. We can see Him now, too, if we look close.

See more information on the song discussed
above in these sources: TheComplete Book of Hymns – Inspiring
Stories About 600 Hymns and Praise Songs by William J. Petersen and Ardythe
Petersen, Tyndale House Publishers, 2006; and Amazing Grace: 366 Inspiring
Hymn Stories for Daily Devotions by Kenneth W. Osbeck, Kregel Publications,
1990.

Saturday, November 14, 2015

It most likely coalesced in this 26-year old single young
woman as she lived in northeast Ohio (see map here), and was influenced, at
least indirectly, by her father. Jessie Brown (she later married a preacher
named Pounds) may have even listened to one of her father’s evangelistic
messages as she considered her musical question “Will You Not Tell It Today?”.
It sounds like someone trying to prod a listening heart into action, so maybe it
was a father speaking to his daughter, and she repeating the conversation. She also
may have had an editor from one point in her life, and maybe even a president
(Garfield), to credit for the poetry she composed that year. And, there may
have been others in her world whose debates had stirred her spirit to
self-reflection. Jessie was the product of a community, and so she
reciprocated, someone might say.

Jessie Brown’s precocious childhood probably left very few acquaintances
surprised at her progression and achievement as a writer-poet-composer. Her
father’s conversion and eventual choice to become a pastor and her mother’s
role as a schoolteacher undoubtedly influenced Jessie’s knowledge-seeking
spirit in childhood. It’s said that this schoolgirl listened to lots of debates
among the Hiram (northeast Ohio)-area intellectuals – including James A.
Garfield -- as religion and politics were thrown about verbally. It was no
accident that Jessie was a writing prodigy as a teenager and went to college at
Hiram before needing to withdraw unfortunately because of poor health. She’d also been sickly as a child, and therefore
most likely got a concentrated dose of her mother’s teaching and her father’s
preaching in the home. When she was 15, Jessie was producing articles for
Cleveland newspapers and faith-based publications, and later was mentored by
Isaac Errett, the well-known editor of Christian
Standard. She spent most of her life
of 60 years in her native area, thinking and writing of life there. Much of her
productivity was the at least 400 (some say 800) hymn poems she composed, reflecting
the ardent heart she possessed for spreading the Christian faith. Her words in “Will
You Not Tell It Today” were a product of the area’s local Christian community,
the Disciples of Christ. The words sound like what might have been sung during
an evangelism campaign, or what might have been more commonly called a ‘meeting’.
The first two verses have her pondering personally
the gratitude she has for her Savior, and how that compels the hymn’s question.
Verse three turns the focus completely on hearers who’ve yet to commit. It’s a three-verse
pattern very familiar to meeting-goers, certainly, and also to a young woman
trained hearing others talk, teach, preach, debate, and urge others to a
viewpoint.

Jessie Brown did what came easy for her, given the
upbringing she experienced. She also loved her northeastern Ohio home, and left
it only on occasion, it’s said. The nurture she felt found its way through her
hands onto the pages of hundreds of songs and other written words, and so she
was doing something that could be described as circular. What she received, she
put back into her output, which fed her community, and must have fed her too so
that she could go on repeating this cycle. Hey, that kinda sounds like a
church, doesn’t it? Now you know how to get fed.

Saturday, November 7, 2015

It’s
seems clear from his words over 20 years later that he was still affected by
the experience. He had noticeable body scars and still wore a name that told others
of that life-changing experience. Had he perhaps carried the flag of war for
his unit in battle (perhaps not unlike the one shown here being carried by
knights in about 1301)? Daniel Webster Whittle might quickly tell you or me
that another event that coincided with his war likewise had a long-lasting
impact. But, he could not have known that his reflection on war in “There’s a
Royal Banner” (also known as the “Banner of the Cross”) would be picked up by
another, one Lloyd Otis Sanderson, whose birth and songwriting milestones three
generations after his own would have curious coincidences with his life. It
would be interesting to see these two meet sometime, and marvel over how the
musical Spirit might have been at work.

Daniel
Whittle had a name and the war experience to match as he developed a hymn (one
that a fellow hymnist would later enlarge) in 1887 that he must have wanted to
relate to another, larger battle. He’d been in the U.S. Civil War, and having
lost his right arm and still carrying the name ‘Major’— his wartime rank—he still
thought plenty about how his life took a turn as a young man in his early 20s. He
may have lost an arm, but he gained something else – a Christian faith – while imprisoned
in a camp. His postwar experience eventually linked him to Dwight Moody and
evangelism that became the purpose of his being. So, as a 47-year old one-armed
preacher, it wasn’t hard for Major Whittle to tell others that life was a
battle, and that it mattered what side you chose. Of course, choose God!
Whittle’s memory, as a hospital-bound prisoner some 25 years earlier, probably
still reverberated. Just check out the words ‘soldiers’, ‘crimson banner’, and
of course ‘marching’ in his poetry, all conjuring mental images of what Daniel
had known personally, intimately, even brutally. His words say ‘transform all
that’: If you’re to be a prisoner-of-war, be one in Christ’s battle. You think
that might have resonated with Lloyd Sanderson, too? He was a 47-year old, like
Whittle, when he composed a fifth verse for the Major’s original hymn in 1948.
It’s also interesting that Whittle’s life was ending in 1901 while Lloyd’s was
beginning – Sanderson was born in May 1901 just two months after Whittle’s
death in March of the same year. Is it just a curious coincidence that these
47-year olds carried Christ’s battle flag, through their verses in “There’s a
Royal Banner”? As Whittle departed the earth, was Lloyd being prepared for a 5th
verse? Perhaps it’s just a piece of trivia, but the Spirit has done some startling
things, agreed?

Lloyd
Sanderson’s verse includes a word ‘commander’ that would have been familiar to
his musical ancestor, the Major. Did he wear a uniform, like Whittle, at one
time? It really doesn’t matter if he did, or if you or I do. Daniel Whittle put
away his uniform, but carried a flag still. Our commander may be in charge and be
called the ‘Almighty’, but he still needs troops. Whittle and Sanderson did
their part. They knew whose side wins. Do you? It’s not a hard question.

See more
information on the primary composer of the song discussed above in these
sources: TheComplete Book of Hymns – Inspiring Stories About 600
Hymns and Praise Songs by William J. Petersen and Ardythe Petersen, Tyndale
House Publishers, 2006; and Amazing Grace: 366 Inspiring Hymn Stories for
Daily Devotions by Kenneth W. Osbeck, Kregel Publications, 1990; and 101
Hymn Stories, by Kenneth W. Osbeck, Kregel Publications, 1982. A biography
on the song’s secondary (verse 5) composer is in the book edited by Gene Finley
(1980), Our Garden of Song (West Monroe, LA: Howard Publishing Co.).